TRIBOELECTRICITY: Triboelectricity is when one of two objects can give extra electrons and the other can receive more electrons. Then the two objects want to balance out and get closer until it make contact to transfer the electrons to one another. As an example, we used an electroscope to see how much charge something has like a vinyl record and cotton. Another example is lightning storms. When it is really dry the clouds get extra electrons and the earth can always take some more in so the clouds get closer to ground and then ZAP! The way our electroscope works is that we have a paperclip through a piece of felt and into a wine glass. on the end of the clip there are two leaves of foil. When we put a charge near the clip the tin leaves spread apart because either electrons or protons are nearing the edge of the paper clip to try to touch the charged object which gives us what happens.

LEYDEN JAR: A Leyden jar is a type of insulator in the form of a cup or jar. There is a vinyl comb on top of the cup with a paperclip chain touching the tin foil surrounding the inside. There is also coin on the outside of the cup. When a charged item nears the paperclip chain the electrons transfer to the paperclip chain storing the charge. Then, you will be able to hear a crackling noise. That noise it the electrons trying to balance to the outside foil. Then we touched the outside foil and the paper clip clip chain to feel a little shock to show it has a charge.

Insulators are materials that don’t conduct electricity and conductors are materials that do conduct electricity. For my tests insulators made my circuit tester not light up and conductors made my circuit tester light up. Here is my circuit tester.

Nine out of the eleven conductors that  I tested were metals and the other ones were salt water and graphite. I think those metals conduct because they let the electricity flow through easily. I have no idea how graphite works.  What really surprised me was that only salt water conducted electricity out of bottled water and vinegar. I think it worked because the salt let the electricity flow.

Three fourths of the insulators I tested were made of multiple materials instead of one or two. So based on my notes, the materials with multiple elements won’t conduct electricity. I was wondering if I rubbed a balloon on my head would my hair conduct sadly it didn’t work.

This quarter we worked on a labyrinth game to donate to the 1st and kindergarden classes. First, we drew a blueprint. Then, we made a prototype out of cardboard. After that, we cut our bases and walls. Next, we had to mark out where the holes and walls woulwould be  

 
 There were many different inventions during the 3rd and 1st century one was the water wheel. There are 4 different types of water flow. 1: overshot. 2: undershot. 3: breast shot. Finally 4: pitch back. CD RAINBOw is a water wheel to lift a load. CD Rainbow is built for breast shot and picthback. When we tried breast shot it sucked. Picthback on the other hand was 10x better! We made this so our water wheel can pick up loads of water so it could lift heavy loads. We maximized the space by only making 5 blades. With time and foucus CD RAINBOW will wheel us to victory

 SIDE VIEW of huge lips. (Left)

FRONT VIEW of all the space inside. 

  BACK VIEW of curve.

SIDE VIEW (Right)

 PERFORMANCE CHART / STATS OF EFFICIENCY

 (WE WON)

 Test 1 (RED): Breast shot Used too much energy because we used 1 joule of energy to lift .25o kg.

Test 2 (GRAY): Picthback Used less energy with a heavier load .1 joule for .35 kg.

Test 3 (GOLD): Picthback most load with least amount of energy .

Test 4 (GREEN): Picthback lifted .702 kg with a little too much energy.

This post tells you about how our bot (meatbox) won and its strategies.

#1 Defense: The defensive strategy is simple if our front touch sensor is released from its touch it would immediately back up and spin randomly until it sees something. Also a key to our success was having our wheels in the center of the bot so it provided a safer chance of not getting lifted by our opponent. It also allowed the chassis a faster spin.

#2 Offense: Our offense is a loop which means it will go no and on for ever until we turn it off. So it would wait until something came in its vision then it would attack. With the design we would try to lift our opponent and win. That strategy worked sometimes.

#3 Search: The search strategy was to simply spin and wait for our opponent to come. Then, the Meatbox viscously attacks making the opposing bot run for their lives.

The meatbox only lost one match but epicly defeated the other bots with 2 hands tied behind its back. The opponents robots  were called Exploding Penguins, A+O=US, Zeus’s Thunder, The Pancake, and one unknown bot. Our combination of time, effort, awesomeness, and teamwork led our team and bot to VICTORY!!!!

Science posts go here…

Lab Projects (photos, diagrams, slideshows, & videos of your completed Projects or Project Exams);
Theory Slideshows and Animated Simulations (Use Keynote to make animations!): Explanations of: How Human’s Hear, How Speaker’s Work, etc;
Science Posters (scan or create digitally);
Combined Science-History Projects (e.g., Inventions Timeline; e.g. History of The: Automobile, Cell Phone, etc.); Combined Science-Math Projects (SONAR math challenges, etc.).